1937-03-31 — Page 6

THE HONGKONG. TELEGRAPH, WEDNESDAY, March 31, 1987.

WATSON'S

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ESTD. 1841.

TEL. 20016.

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AUTOMOTIVE

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Stubbs Road

ANNOUNCEMENT.

The marriage arranged between Mr. Sidney Ells Edgar and Miss Dolores Paterson will take place on Saturday, 3rd April, 1937. No invitations are being issued but all friends will be welcome at a reception to be held after- wards at the Jacobean Room, Hong Kong Hotel, 12 Noqn.

The

Hongkong Telegraph.

WEDNESDAY, March 31, 1937.

SIGNS OF RECOVERY

IL

S. MOUTRIE & CO., LTD. end of the year, the Colony's

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Chater Road.

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is absolutely the most healthy, comfortablė

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SPECIAL PRICE

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FURNISHING DEPT.

FAMILY ALBUM

"It fonchas a lot which is good

to remember.."

HE Family Album Jay impressively open. It is an Austere volume which, In 11 former generation, would have commanded respect nay, reverential awe.

But not in this generation. It merely provoked nudgings, whisperings and disrespectful giggles.

"Tisn't," gurgled the Five-Year- Old, like a kettle coming to the boil. "Can't be. It's too funny for him."

"Course it is." Insisted the Seven-Year-Old. "It's him in a furry bonnet and jacket when he

was baby. It's a Little Grumphy Bear

who said, 'And who's been eating my porridge?'” chimed in the F.-Y.-O.

And they both laughed so much,. they had hiccoughs.

In a Nazi household, that Family" Album would probably have been suppressed 48 subversive to parental discipline." --But here, thank goodness, we can still laugh at "when Father was a boy."

Anyway, that Family Album de- serves to be prized, not merely because it amuses the children, nor because of sentimental reasons, but because it is the humble record of an ordinary family.

TO family crest embossca

N

its cover. No genealo- gical tree, rooted In

by Ritchie Calder

mution, slcoves, or the preposter- ous busties. or the grannies' mufches," or even that bonnet and sheepskin jacket that bedeelted a helpless innocent a quarter of a century ago.

Or, for that matter, at the "Sunday school outings" in which the Victorian fathers and mothers sit enthroned among their numerous offspring.

B

UT that Family Album teaches a lot which is Bood to remember.

There are black sheep in it, of course, like the feckless one who abandoned a tradition of hard-

вла working craftsmen

pulpit aspirants to follow the doubtful profession of writing-"Living on hls wits," they called it,

Otherwise, it is a modest, credit- able testimony to "homely Joye and destiny obscure."

And it is a useful commentary on heredity, which has stamped its characteristics and resemblances on page after page. The family resemblances are probably the more marked because in a small town in a Scottish strath, breed- ing

to type 13. ог rather was, a matter of circunscribed geography,

They practised eugenics," not because they knew what it was nor

High Estate, however remote, ever heard of Galton, but because,

daunts upon its fly-leaf.

Its gilt-cdging is the only sug- gestion of gold or wealth you will fnd in that record.. Indeed, there is not a portrait, from the faded daguerrotypes to the, present day, which does not represent meagre savings, grudgingly spent.

To-day we may grin at the mut- ton-chop whiskers, the leg

"

in a restricted community "family skeletons were kept, not in the family cupboard but in the public

museum.

WAS

That is, in the sense that every-" body knew everybody else's his- tory, so that "bad blood more or less, kept out.

Yet into ano" collateral branch

the genealogists say, there

strayed an "incomer" far removed from the stald, prosaic tradition.

It was a foundling gipsy girl, left behind when the wanderers struck camp, adopted and reared by a cottar" familly. She married one of thosc úme-carved-granite Scotsmen, whose rugged features stand out like bas-reliefs in the pages of the album.

Which explains the otherwise mysterious loc-black eyes which mingle with the blue.

Yet a sloc-eyed grandson of that head-shaking marriage "wagged.

#

noble pow" in the pulpit.. And another chose the street corner as his "kirk" and became a brilliant and esteemed leader of the Salva- tion Army.

The more one studies that Family Album and its key, the his-

tory of each individual; the more one has to ask, How much can one blame on heredity and how much on the circumstances of life in which they found themselves?

T

HIB brings me to my godson, Stanley. Stan- ley's father is a business Bo on his own account." man was his father, and grandfather before him, and what was good enough for them is good enough for him."

and is a useful

commentary on heredity."

:

alchemy of heredity has changed "the blood "?

Is it not just male arroganco which discards the mother and the grandmothers and the great.. grandmothers who may have Lempered that hard business "blood"?

.

Anyway. I think we take hered- Ity too much for granted, with, at the moment, not enough actual knowledge to support it.

S

OME eugenists now hold it established that the tendency to consump- tion is hereditary,, although the disenso Itself Is an infection, aggravated by living conditions.

They urge caution-quité pro. perly upon couples who know that, on both sides, there have been consumptive forbears..

But, although there are workers engaged on researches into human "genetics and humans heredity in" all parts of the world, it is far from being an 'exact science” on which people can dogmatise.

It is easy to quote "family his- tories "to show how the Phelps- Bossy" Phelps, the the family of

been King's Bargeman have Thames watermen for generations. Or the Torrys, including Ellen, Fred, the Nellson-Terrys and the Gielguda (Val of the B.B.C. and John, the actor) as evidence of the "stage-heredity."

Or the Darwins and Huxleys and Haldanes. Or the Churchills. And using them to prove "like father,

So Stanley, who craves to be a welter, is to be condemned to the uke son:"

family business.

If he "welshes," as his father puts it, it is the end of a dynasty. The business will cease to be a family concern. And Stanley is a dutiful son....

But is it right? True, as his father says, "the business ought to be in his blood." But does hig futher know how far the subtle

The Menace Of "Bright

Young

Sa. far from an expected de- ficit of considerable dimensions being shown, the Colony's finan cial returns for 1936, just made public, reveal that revenue ex- ceeded expenditure by half million dollars. The result in not wholly due to the applica- tion of the economy axe, for it is disclosed that revenue mark- edly increased under many of the tne major headings. At end of the year, the Colony's credit balance totalled almost thirteen million dollars-a posi- tion which is decidedly better than was anticipated when the Budget was introduced. The improved out-turn of revenue, indicative of the existence of better times, encourages the hope that when the current year ends the credit balance will not have dropped to the eight mil- lions forecast when the 1937 Budget was introduced, a 'Bud- get which provided .for drawing on surpluses in order to cope with the expectation of

that superficial stratum of society a.deficit of three and a half known as the Bright Young Things- million dollars. Given a con- that they were neither young nor bright, and I believe, in some cases, tinuance of present conditions, that this may be said to be true. with trade showing an all-days, the term Bright Young Things generally speaking, in these round recovery, the Colony's covers the section of the populace of finances should at the year-end all ages, classes, and mentalities who,

for reasons best known to themselves build a community based on brother- be in a far healthier condition seem to exist for the sole purpose of hood and love of humanity." than seemed likely six months getting the best possible time out of ago. It has to be borne in the feelings of other people or for

life without the slightest regard for Selfish Lives- mind, of course, that the origin- their own responsibilities, as members

of the community.

It is perhaps worthy of mention that a few weeks ago a divine of an al estimates for 1936 were based

Recently a clergyman, the Rev. C. other religious denomination, in a on a 18. 8d. dollar,' and that Ensor Walters, at the Methodist Con- West London district also spoke stern- when it became apparent that ference at Newcastle, put into words on the morals and behaviour of exchange would not average ing people of to-action of the com- example.

thoughts of a great many think- the modern young woman and warn-

when he Bald:

ed his congregation against her anything like that level, special measures, including increased munity which is a danger to the State

section much advertised, whose It has, of course, been fashionable taxation, had to be taken to cope life seems to consist of cocktail and always for an older generation to one, but a continuous round of par- with the situation. None the sherry, parties, cabarets and mid-criticise a younger one; at the same

tles, lasting until the small hours of time, and having regard to the con- less, there is evidence in the night revelries.

dition of the world in general to-day, the morning, at which the principal figures of a better state of There are decadent Bright Young we may well ask ourselves whether business is the umbibing of dozens of affairs all round. Even land gloom and disaster. Let these pen- not inclined to lead the most cannot be said to constitute, relaxa- Things who are the forerunners of some sections of our young people cocktails and the talking of scandal, sales, which have been declining ple be warned. We live in. stern selfish of existences, and whether or participatoo good in any way for the in recent years, were very little times. Every patriot must seek to not, in this matter, the parents of to- below the estimate and were

day are somewhat to blame?

In point of fact, it seems to me that many of our young people have lost For some reason or other it has al-

S

the

OMEONE onco said-discussing

Is

Things"

BY LADY BLAND SUTTON

A

Doing One's Job

A glance at the newspapers on practically any day of the year shows us that, at this time, the world is rent with dissension and discord. While one Bection of the world seeks Beeks avenues for peace another clamours for war; and whilst a part of nations demands revolution for one ideal an- other

wants an upheaval for another. It seems that many people will even go to the trouble of warfare in order

to decimate other people in their search for peace.

I wonder how it is that with this

atmosphere of danger in the world the people of all countries, and of all ages, do not realise the necessity in their daily lives of a more or less quiet existence and at least a 1p- service to the tradition of pretending to do a job.

Relaxation is necessary for every-

*** | have excitement at all costs, and they

Or they might take the text-book families, the Jukes and the Edwards, the Jukes being a pró- generation unc family which after generation" helped to All the American jails, and the Edwards, being An American" ruling family," comparable to the Chur- chills or the Cecils.

But as good a case for environ- ment as for heredity. In any of these cases. "Environment". is the condition of life in which people are reared and live.

The Jukes were

criminal family, but how far were their criminal tendencies the result of their upbringing,' their associates and their station in life?

How far did the atmosphere, the associations, the opportunities and family privileges in politics, on the stage, or in the world of science in- fluence the, successive generations of the others?

For men and women are not like animals and plants. They cannot be segregated and bred according to carefully planned, man-dic- tated patterns.

B

UT knowledge 18- BC- cumulating. For

ample, there are fascl- nating and amusing researches into the heredity of "genlus.”

One body of research dealk with musical genius. The experts have differentiated the musical attri butes into afteen characteristics—

rhythm, harmony, "ear," etc which total up to "genius.”

One export was so sure of his ground that when he found that a girl had the 18 attributes of genius and the combined attributes of the parents did not add up to 15. he told them bluntly that the girl was not their daughter; he did not know how, or why, but she wasn't.

After appropriate tadignation. the mother oventunity. confessed that her husband was' not the father, but an orchestra leader. Was!

Which may, or may not, have been the origin of the song, "Why: did she fall for the Leader of the Band?

some $24,000 better than in increasing year by year, namely, ways been expected that the genera- the ability for enjoying themselves 1985. Despite a drop of $166,- pensions. These for 1936 total- tion which follows upon a war should,

md. In some quiet manner; they must 000 in revenue, the railway led no less a sum than $2,287,-in some respects, lack the virtue of are prepared to pay all sorts of showed a working profit of 745, on an estimate of $1,810,- I have never been able to follow prices to get h

the proceding generation. Personal- nearly half a million dollars, 000. Additions to this item are this somewhat peculiar line of rea- They do not realise the danger of again demonstrating the point still continuous, and it le in-soning, because it seems to me that this process. Excitement Invariably that this Government under-evitable that the Colony will the horrors of war and the universal breeds a desire for further excite- taking is proving an extremely have a heavy burden to bear on misery that follow upon the heels of ment, and, in the search for If the Armageddon should in themselves mind and brain become used to a useful source of revenue to the this vote for many years to constitute an example for any young hectic method of thought which Colony, uties, at over five come. All in all, however, the generation.

eneration. the there are of to-morrow.

takes Bitle heed of to-day and less million dollars, were a million Colony's finances can be describ- Yot I must confess that there are and three-quarters above the ed as distinctly healthy, and, which one might consider best equip arriving at middle age, will have certain sections of society and those Too many of these young people, original estimate, whilst the with trade Improving and a ped for the business of setting cause to regret the wasted hours and Post-Office continuca to pay a general feeling of greater con examples which seem to think of the physical and mental strain to something that is so ephemeral that handsome return. On the exfidence all round, we may which, all other things being exhaust selves, and the realisation that the Pleasure is not

nothing but a search for pleasure, which they have subjected them it is hardly worth consideration. penditure alde, there is one reasonably, look for, even bettered usually ends in search for most precious years of their lives through excitement, The item, however, which is steadily times ahead.

citement.

bave been wasted in the search for

-To-day's Thought ---*** GOOD painting is like good cooking: it can be fasted; but not explained,

MIDOR EVLAMINOK,

Continted on Pag